A top federal court official defended Judge James Boasberg’s gag orders that hid subpoenas related to the FBI’s Arctic Frost investigation, saying this week that the chief judge in Washington would likely have been unaware that the subpoenas’ intended targets were members of Congress.

The administrative office for the federal courts indicated that the chief judge in D.C. routinely blindly signed gag orders when the Department of Justice requested them, including during Arctic Frost, the investigation that led to former special counsel Jack Smith bringing election charges against President Donald Trump.

The administrative office’s director, Robert Conrad Jr., provided the explanation on behalf of Boasberg to Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, in a letter first obtained by Fox News Digital.

The letter came in response to Grassley, Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., and Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, demanding an explanation from Boasberg about why he authorized the one-year gag orders, which barred phone companies from telling Republican Congress members that their records were subpoenaed by Smith in 2023.

Conrad said he could not address those specific subpoenas and gag orders, in part because some of the material was sealed, but that he could help the lawmakers ‘understand relevant practices’ in place during Arctic Frost.

The DOJ’s requests for gag orders, also known as non-disclosure orders, ‘typically do not attach the related subpoena; rather they identify the subject accounts only by a signifier — e.g., a phone number,’ Conrad wrote. ‘As a result, [non-disclosure order] applications would not reveal whether a particular phone number belonged to a member of Congress.’

Read a copy of the letter below. App users click here.

Grassley reacted to the latest correspondence from the court by faulting the Biden DOJ for seeking the gag orders from Boasberg without notifying the judge that they pertained to Congress members.

Grassley noted that the DOJ’s Public Integrity Section gave Smith’s team the green light to subpoena lawmakers’ phone records but had also told the prosecutors to be wary of concerns lawmakers could raise about the Constitution’s speech or debate clause, which gives Congress members added protections in prosecutorial matters.

‘Smith went ahead with the congressional subpoenas anyway, and it appears he and his team didn’t apprise the court of member involvement,’ Grassley told Fox News Digital. ‘Smith’s apparent lack of candor is deeply troubling, and he needs to answer for his conduct.’

The DOJ revised its policy in response to an inspector general report in 2024 so that prosecutors were required to notify the court if they were seeking a gag order against a Congress member so that judges could take that into consideration when deciding whether to authorize the orders. Smith’s subpoenas pre-dated that policy shift.

The subpoenas, and the gag orders that kept them concealed, have drawn enormous criticism from the targeted lawmakers, who alleged that the Biden DOJ improperly spied on them over their alleged involvement in attempting to overturn the 2020 election and that Boasberg was complicit in allowing it. Among the top critics is Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, who was set to lead a since-postponed hearing Wednesday examining the case for impeaching Boasberg. Impeachment of judges is exceedingly rare and typically has only occurred in response to crimes like corruption and bribery.

Johnson said he remained unsatisfied with Boasberg after the letter from the administrative office.

‘Judge Boasberg’s refusal to answer questions from Congress about his approval of unlawful gag orders is an affront to transparency and an obvious attempt to deflect any responsibility for his awareness of or involvement in Jack Smith’s partisan dragnet,’ Johnson told Fox News Digital. ‘Judge Boasberg must immediately lift the seal that is apparently preventing him from addressing Congress’ questions and provide the public a full explanation for his actions.’

Public documents reveal that as chief judge of the D.C. federal court, Boasberg authorized numerous gag orders that blocked phone companies from telling about a dozen House and Senate lawmakers that Smith had subpoenaed their phone data.

Smith had sought a narrow set of their records, which included details about when calls and messages were placed and with whom the Congress members were communicating. The records did not include the contents of calls and messages. Smith has defended the subpoenas, saying they were in line with department policy and ‘entirely proper.’

The chances of a bipartisan solution to expiring Obamacare subsidies are growing slimmer with each passing day as the Senate gears up for a vote next week on extending the credits.

Senate Democrats made the subsidies the focal point of their position during the government shutdown, which ended only after a group of Democrats broke from Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., based largely on a guarantee from Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., that lawmakers would get a chance to vote on extending the subsidies.

And next week is Thune’s deadline to get a proposal on the floor, but the likelihood that it is bipartisan is fast fading.

‘I mean, my assumption is that by next week, when we have to have that vote, that we might not be far enough along in the bipartisan discussions. But my assumption is we’ll still have a vote of some kind, because that’s what we’re committed to do,’ Thune said.

Bipartisan talks have been ongoing, both during the shutdown and in the weeks after. But those have yet to yield a plan that could muster the 60 votes necessary to break through the filibuster in the upper chamber.

Republicans want to see reforms to the program and are floating proposals that would see money from the subsidies that normally flows to insurance companies be sent directly to Health Savings Accounts (HSAs) — a plan previously floated by President Donald Trump.

Democrats, however, want a cleaner extension of subsidies but are open to reforms either up front or down the line.

Sen. Roger Marshall, R-Kan., told Fox News Digital he’s been involved in talks with colleagues across the aisle, but those discussions had recently slowed. He agreed that a bipartisan solution was likely out of reach by next week’s vote.

‘I mean, I would love to see that, but it’s not realistic, and I’m putting my eggs into the basket for Jan. 30, a nice bipartisan package,’ he said.

At that point, however, the subsidies will have expired.

That leaves the option of a possible side-by-side vote, with Democratic and Republican proposals put on the floor to see which survives. But that idea may not have much support, either.

‘I don’t know about whether they would have the appetite for a side-by-side,’ Sen. Tammy Baldwin, D-Wis., said. ‘We certainly have not seen Republicans come up with any sincere plans to help alleviate the concerns.’

Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Chair Bill Cassidy, R-La., who is leading Republicans’ negotiations for a plan on the subsidies, scoffed that if Democrats spoke with him, ‘You’re going to be hearing a lot of sincerity.’

Cassidy’s plan revolves around HSAs, which he sketched out in broad terms to Fox News Digital. Under his plan, HSAs would be pre-funded with, ‘say $2,000,’ that he argued would see Americans pay roughly the same health insurance deductibles and act as a much more workable day-to-day policy moving forward.

He noted that Democrats see where he’s coming from, but that he couldn’t say if he’s got ‘their vote yet.’

‘If you look at the numbers, there are people who are in their 50s and 60s who will really, like, pay a third of their income for insurance on the exchange, and so the Democrats have set it up so there’s a cliff at the end of this year, and we’re trying to avoid that cliff,’ Cassidy said.

‘So [we’re] looking for a way that can take care of those folks but begin to transition to a system which is much more workable,’ he continued. ‘The Obamacare subsidy system is not workable.’

Cassidy and Senate Finance Committee Chair Mike Crapo, R-Idaho, pitched ideas and options during the Senate GOP’s closed-door lunch on Tuesday, but there still wasn’t a solid consensus on a path forward on a Republican proposal.

Sen. John Kennedy, R-La., said it would take ‘divine intervention’ for Republicans to agree on a plan to vote on by Thune’s deadline next week.

‘Have you ever heard of a Rorschach test where it’s smeared all over the wall? That’s kind of where we’re at,’ Kennedy said.

Members on both sides of the aisle believe that Trump should get more involved, too, given that anything that passes the Senate and works through the House would need his signature to become law.

Sen. Angus King, I-Maine, one of the eight Democratic caucus members that voted to reopen the government with Republicans, said that it would help if Trump told the Senate GOP to make a deal.

‘I think the easiest, clearest thing would be a straight extension with some modest reforms, and then we can move on,’ King said. ‘And frankly, if it doesn’t happen, then the Republicans can own massive premium increases. And I don’t know why they would want to do that.’

Secretary of War Pete Hegseth chastised the press following media reports that he signed off on a second strike against an alleged drug boat after the first one left survivors. 

The Trump administration has come under renewed scrutiny for its strikes in the Caribbean targeting alleged drug smugglers, after the Washington Post reported on Friday that Hegseth verbally ordered everyone onboard the alleged drug boat to be killed in a Sept. 2 operation. The Post reported that a second strike was conducted to take out the remaining survivors on the boat. 

On Monday, the White House confirmed that a second strike had occurred, but disputed that Hegseth ever gave an initial order to ensure that everyone on board was killed, when asked specifically about Hegseth’s instructions.

Hegseth said that he watched the first strike live, but did not see any survivors at that time amid the fire and the smoke — and blasted the press for their reporting.

‘This is called the fog of war. This is what you in the press don’t understand,’ Hegseth told reporters at a Cabinet meeting on Tuesday. ‘You sit in your air-conditioned offices or up on Capitol Hill and you nit pick, and you plant fake stories in the Washington Post about ‘kill everybody’ phrases on anonymous sources not based in anything, not based in any truth at all. And then you want to throw out really irresponsible terms about American heroes, about the judgment that they made.’ 

Hegseth said that after watching the first strike, he left for a meeting and later learned of the second strike. The White House said Monday that Hegseth had authorized Adm. Frank ‘Mitch’ Bradley to conduct the strikes, and that Bradley was the one who ordered and directed the second one. 

At the time of the Sept. 2 strike, Bradley was serving as the commander of Joint Special Operations Command, which falls under U.S. Special Operations Command. He is now the head of U.S. Special Operations Command.

According to Hegseth, carrying out a subsequent strike on the alleged drug boat was the right call. 

‘Admiral Bradley made the correct decision to ultimately sink the boat and eliminate the threat,’ Hegseth said Tuesday. 

Meanwhile, reports of the second strike have attracted even more scrutiny from lawmakers on both sides of the aisle on Capitol Hill and calls for greater oversight, amid questions about the strikes’ legality. 

‘This committee is committed to providing rigorous oversight of the Department of Defense’s military operations in the Caribbean,’ Reps. Mike Rogers, R-Ala., and Adam Smith, D-Wash., who lead the House Armed Services Committee, said in a statement on Saturday. ‘We take seriously the reports of follow-on strikes on boats alleged to be ferrying narcotics in the SOUTHCOM region and are taking bipartisan action to gather a full accounting of the operation in question.’

Hegseth said Tuesday that although there has been a pause in strikes in the Caribbean because alleged drug boats are becoming harder to find, the Trump administration’s campaign against the influx of drugs will continue. 

‘We’ve only just begun striking narco-boats and putting narco-terrorists at the bottom of the ocean because they’ve been poisoning the American people,’ Hegseth said. 

The Trump administration has carried out more than 20 strikes against alleged drug boats in Latin American waters, and has bolstered its military presence in the Caribbean to align with Trump’s goal to crack down on the influx of drugs into the U.S.

On about two dozen occasions, the Supreme Court had to step in during President Trump’s second term because many inferior courts refused to accept that he is the president. The justices must do so again, after lower courts invalidated the appointments of acting U.S. attorneys Alina Habba of the District of New Jersey and Lindsey Halligan of the Eastern District of Virginia.

The Senate has a tradition that is over a century old called the blue slip. Home-state senators have an extraordinary power: the ability to veto U.S. marshals, U.S. attorneys, and U.S. district judges. In order for nominees to proceed, home-state senators must return a blue slip approving the nominations. Senators will never let this power go, so administrations have to bear the consequences. In New Jersey, leftist senators Cory Booker and Andy Kim have refused to allow the nomination of Alina Habba to serve as U.S. Attorney. Likewise, in Virginia, their fellow leftist senators Tim Kaine and Mark Warner will not acquiesce to the nomination of Lindsey Halligan to serve as U.S. Attorney. As such, Attorney General Pam Bondi appointed Habba and Halligan to 120-day terms to serve on an interim basis, as 28 U.S.C. § 546 allows. Halligan replaced another interim prosecutor, Eric Siebert, who departed shortly before his 120 days lapsed.

After 120 days have expired, leftists asserted that Bondi can make no more appointments, only district judges can. The Executive Branch, this argument goes, has no say whatsoever after 120 days. This result would lead to a scheme where leftist senators can block President Trump’s nominees. Then, courts composed mostly of leftist judges in these blue states can install leftist puppet U.S. attorneys, and the Executive Branch must grin and bear it, just as with the blue slip process.

The 120-day limit first appeared in a statute in 1986. During the years of presidents Clinton and Bush, attorneys general made successive 120-day appointments under the statutory scheme in effect from 1986-2006, the same scheme as today. Yet, Clinton Judge Cameron Currie of South Carolina did not view this historical evidence as persuasive when she invalidated Halligan’s appointment. Halligan secured indictments against New York Attorney General Letitia James for mortgage fraud and former FBI Director James Comey for false statements to and obstruction of Congress concerning the Russiagate hoax.

Those indictments are, for the moment, invalid. Currie’s opinion drips with disdain for Halligan, noting Halligan’s lack of prosecutorial experience. This issue is irrelevant to the legal question. Halligan, under Currie’s analysis, could have had three decades of prosecutorial experience, and her appointment would still have violated the Constitution’s Appointments Clause. Currie also quoted another irrelevant piece of evidence: President Trump’s social media post demanding Bondi move faster on prosecutions. Whether Halligan’s appointment is valid has nothing to do with that post. Its inclusion thus has no valid legal purpose.

The Appointments Clause vests appointment power in a president, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, for principal officers. Congress can also require the advice and consent process to apply to inferior officers, and it did so with respect to U.S. attorneys. As such, presidents nominate U.S. attorneys, and the Senate confirms them. When there are vacancies, attorneys general can fill them for 120 days at a time, and a separate part of Section 546 allows for district courts to make appointments after the 120 days have expired. The Constitution grants department heads and courts the power to appoint inferior officers. District judges, for example, appoint magistrate judges.

Section 546 does not vest the authority to appoint U.S. attorneys exclusively in district courts. Under the reading of the judges who have invalidated the appointments of Habba and Halligan, a future President J.D. Vance’s attorney general could not make a 120-day appointment, either. The text of Section 546 does not specify a 120-day appointment per president. When one president’s attorney general makes a 120-day appointment, these judges absurdly prevent any future president’s attorney general from doing so in that district. District judges therefore have all the power until the Senate confirms a nominee one of these years or decades.

Fortunately, the issue now is ripe for Supreme Court review. This week, a Third Circuit panel ruled that Habba’s appointment is invalid. The justices should decide the cases together, even though the Fourth Circuit has not ruled on the Halligan appeal. There is only one circuit with all states that have Republican senators: the Fifth. This district court control could continue into the terms of a President Vance.

The easiest way to correct the lower court’s error is for the Supreme Court to hold that Section 546 allows attorneys general to make more than one 120-day appointment. Alternatively, the justices could hold that Section 546’s stripping of appointment power from the Executive Branch with respect to its officials violates the separation of powers.

In the face of immense criticism from Democrat politicians, the leftist media, and academic elites, the justices have intervened time and again to thwart unlawful interference by resistance lower courts. Because of the Supreme Court’s intervention on issues ranging from the ability to fire Executive Branch employees to the ability of the president to revoke temporary protected status from illegal immigrants, President Trump has been able to do his job far more effectively.

Bondi, Solicitor General John Sauer, and their team of stellar lawyers have amassed a success rate of over 90% at the Supreme Court. The justices must restore Habba and Halligan to preserve the separation of powers and prevent U.S. attorneys from being servants of district courts instead of presidents.

On about two dozen occasions, the Supreme Court had to step in during President Trump’s second term because many inferior courts refused to accept that he is the president. The justices must do so again, after lower courts invalidated the appointments of acting U.S. attorneys Alina Habba of the District of New Jersey and Lindsey Halligan of the Eastern District of Virginia.

The Senate has a tradition that is over a century old called the blue slip. Home-state senators have an extraordinary power: the ability to veto U.S. marshals, U.S. attorneys and U.S. district judges. In order for nominees to proceed, home-state senators must return a blue slip approving the nominations. Senators will never let this power go, so administrations have to bear the consequences. In New Jersey, leftist Senators Cory Booker and Andy Kim have refused to allow the nomination of Alina Habba to serve as U.S. attorney. Likewise, in Virginia, their fellow leftist Senators Tim Kaine and Mark Warner will not acquiesce to the nomination of Lindsey Halligan to serve as U.S. attorney. As such, Attorney General Pam Bondi appointed Habba and Halligan to 120-day terms to serve on an interim basis, as 28 U.S.C. § 546 allows. Halligan replaced another interim prosecutor, Eric Siebert, who departed shortly before his 120 days lapsed.

After 120 days have expired, leftists asserted that Bondi can make no more appointments; only district judges can. The Executive Branch, this argument goes, has no say whatsoever after 120 days. This result would lead to a scheme where leftist senators can block President Trump’s nominees. Then, courts composed mostly of leftist judges in these blue states can install leftist puppet U.S. attorneys, and the Executive Branch must grin and bear it, just as with the blue slip process.

The 120-day limit first appeared in a statute in 1986. During the years of Presidents Clinton and Bush, attorneys general made successive 120-day appointments under the statutory scheme in effect from 1986-2006, the same scheme as today. Yet, Clinton Judge Cameron Currie of South Carolina did not view this historical evidence as persuasive when she invalidated Halligan’s appointment. Halligan secured indictments against New York Attorney General Letitia James for mortgage fraud and former FBI Director James Comey for false statements to and obstruction of Congress concerning the Russiagate hoax.

Those indictments are, for the moment, invalid. Currie’s opinion drips with disdain for Halligan, noting Halligan’s lack of prosecutorial experience. This issue is irrelevant to the legal question. Halligan, under Currie’s analysis, could have had three decades of prosecutorial experience, and her appointment would still have violated the Constitution’s Appointments Clause. Currie also quoted another irrelevant piece of evidence: President Trump’s social media post demanding Bondi move faster on prosecutions. Whether Halligan’s appointment is valid has nothing to do with that post. Its inclusion thus has no valid legal purpose.

The Appointments Clause vests appointment power in a president, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, for principal officers. Congress can also require the advice and consent process to apply to inferior officers, and it did so with respect to U.S. attorneys. As such, presidents nominate U.S. attorneys, and the Senate confirms them. When there are vacancies, attorneys general can fill them for 120 days at a time, and a separate part of Section 546 allows for district courts to make appointments after the 120 days have expired. The Constitution grants department heads and courts the power to appoint inferior officers. District judges, for example, appoint magistrate judges.

Section 546 does not vest the authority to appoint U.S. attorneys exclusively in district courts. Under the reading of the judges who have invalidated the appointments of Habba and Halligan, President Trump’s attorney general could not make a 120-day appointment, either. The text of Section 546 does not specify a 120-day appointment per president. When one president’s attorney general makes a 120-day appointment, these judges absurdly prevent any future president’s attorney general from doing so in that district. District judges, therefore, have all the power until the Senate confirms a nominee one of these years or decades.

Fortunately, the issue now is ripe for Supreme Court review. This week, a Third Circuit panel ruled that Habba’s appointment is invalid. The justices should decide the cases together, even though the Fourth Circuit has not ruled on the Halligan appeal. There is only one circuit with all states that have Republican senators: the Fifth. This district court control could continue into the terms of a President Vance.

The easiest way to correct the lower court’s error is for the Supreme Court to hold that Section 546 allows attorneys general to make more than one 120-day appointment. Alternatively, the justices could hold that Section 546’s stripping of appointment power from the Executive Branch with respect to its officials violates the separation of powers.

In the face of immense criticism from Democrat politicians, the leftist media, and academic elites, the justices have intervened time and again to thwart unlawful interference by resistance lower courts. Because of the Supreme Court’s intervention on issues ranging from the ability to fire Executive Branch employees to the ability of the president to revoke temporary protected status from illegal immigrants, President Trump has been able to do his job far more effectively.

Bondi, Solicitor General John Sauer, and their team of stellar lawyers have amassed a success rate of over 90% at the Supreme Court. The justices must restore Habba and Halligan to preserve the separation of powers and prevent U.S. attorneys from being servants of district courts instead of presidents.